fiction

Augusto Monterroso – a fable and a tale

irlandesuk fiction, short story , , , ,
Augusto-Monterroso
Augusto Monterroso (1921-2003)

One of the most delightful writers I met in Latin America was Augusto Monterroso. A Guatemalan, he lived for much of his life in Mexico, where he taught in the UNAM university. Before leaving London, I had been given the telephone number of a Nicaraguan poet, Ernesto Mejía Sánchez, and I called him as soon as I got to Mexico City. We agreed to meet one lunchtime at Sanborn’s café, which was where all the artists and writers usually met. At that time Mejía Sánchez was going through a difficult patch in his life, and the conversation was rather strained and dull until Augusto Monterroso turned up. He had with him copies of three of his published works and in each of them he wrote a very individual dedication to me. “I hate to burden you,” he said as he handed them to me. “But you can chuck them into the Atlantic when you fly back to London if you like.” Naturally, I held onto them, still have them today, and they are among my most prized possessions.

mont_dedicAugusto, was extremely warm and jovial and the conversation soon became filled with laughter and great stories and even managed to draw poor Mejía Sánchez out of himself. Monterroso’s writings tend to be short pieces, fables and short stories but always with a humorous and satirical slant. The Colombian Nobel Prize Winner, Gabriel García Márquez said of one of his works: “This book should be read with your hands in the air: its danger is based on its sly wisdom and the deadly beauty of its lack of seriousness”. With a sense of humour very much in tune with that of Julio Cortázar, it was no surprise that when the latter died in 1984, his apartment in Paris was ceded to Augusto Monterroso.

Years after that meeting in Mexico, I was asked by Index on Censorhip to translate a story by Monterroso, entitled “Mister Taylor”. This was a satirical tale about the export of shrunken Guatemalan heads to the American market where they had become fashion accessories. The tone, of course, was very much that of Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal”. In a subsequent book, Augusto touchingly singled out this publication with these words: “I’ve just received a copy of Index on Censorship from London where I story of mine, “Mister Taylor”, translated by John Lyons, has just appeared. Most surprising!” The circle was thus complete!

The frog who wanted to be a real frog

There was once a frog who wanted to be a real frog, and every day she struggled to be so. First she bought a mirror into which she gazed for hours hoping to see her longed-for authenticity. Sometimes she thought she’d found it and sometimes she did not, depending on the mood of that day or hour, until she grew tired of this and put the mirror away in a trunk.

Finally she thought that the only way to be sure of her own worth was through the opinion of others, and she began to do her hair and to dress up and undress (when she had no other option) to see if others approved of her and recognised that she was a real frog.

One day she noticed that what they most admired about her was her body, especially her legs, so she started to do squats and jumps in order to have to better legs, and she felt that everyone applauded her.

And so she continued to push herself harder and harder, and was willing to go to any length to get others to consider her to be a real frog, she even allowed her thighs to be ripped off for others to eat, and as the others devoured them she was still able to hear bitterly when they said, “Excellent frog. Tastes just like chicken.”

The mirror that could not sleep

There was once a hand mirror which when left alone with no one looking into it, felt absolutely dreadful, as though he didn’t exist, and perhaps he was right; but the other mirrors laughed at him, and when at night they were put away in the drawer of the dresser they slept soundly, oblivious to the neurotic’s worries.

Translations by John Lyons

Jonah hits memory lane

irlandesuk drivel, fiction , , , ,

Trials and tribulations

You might think it’s easy running a daily blog, but spare a thought. Some poor devil has to find new material every 24 hours to fill the void. So the blog duty editor is on call Friday night and there’s nothing for the Saturday edition. He’s searched the files high and low and there’s nothing he can use. But just as he’s about to despair, in a cupboard close to where they keep the bleach and other cleaning fluids, he comes across a plastic bag full of mouldy old papers and he takes a look and he discovers a couple of typed sheets with the heading “Jonah hits memory lane”. Someone has used a red felt tip pen to scrawl B-I-N in huge letters across both pages. Nevertheless, he starts to read the piece and only a few seconds in, thinks to himself, God, this is real drivel, I’ll never get away with putting this online, the boss’ll sack me the moment he sobers up on Monday morning. Still, beggars can’t be choosers, so he puts the sheets to one side and continues to hunt for material. About three hours later, he’s still looking and getting more and more exasperated; he’s found absolutely nothing and what’s left of his mind has gone completely blank. He picks up the Jonah story and thinks, Well maybe a change would be good for me. New job, new faces. . . you never know! And he takes the plunge! But you have been warned and you may well want to skip this post.

Jonah hits memory lane

JonahWhale
Jonah gets his comeuppance

Jonah is sitting at a desk in the Humanities 1 Reading Room of the British Library, gazing at the spring sunshine streaming through the dusty transom windows and scratching his head. At fifty-eight he still has a good head of hair, but if he keeps on scratching he’s going to wear a patch in it. Next to his beaten-up laptop is a copy of Murphy, Samuel Beckett’s first novel, published in 1938. To his right, an elderly Indian woman has just put down a book called Astrology, why I believe. Jonah smiles to himself. Personally he’s not a believer. Coming up on the train from Dartford, out of idle curiosity he’d looked at the stars in the Metro free newspaper. Jonah is a Sagittarian by birth, a merchant seaman (retired) by trade, an agnostic by nature, and spent almost half his adult life overseas. But he’s been back in London for the past eighteen months having barely survived his most recent shipwreck off the coast of Brazil.

Just outside London Bridge Station he’d noticed that someone had painted #surviville in huge bright green letters on the walls of a rooftop, and that was just about how he felt now he was back in London, a survivor. However, his stars for that day couldn’t have been more confusing. His horoscope read as follows:

You may be suffering from some major delusion, so watch your step and if the going gets too rough, seek professional help pronto. On the other hand you could be on the brink of a financial or emotional breakthrough, so whatever project you have on the go, money or romance, don’t give up too soon, hang in there at least till the fat lady starts to sing.

Fat lady, indeed, Jonah muttered to himself. He’d never liked opera, never would! Without ceremony, he’d screwed the newspaper up into a ball and tossed it into the bin.

*

Then there was Anna-Belle. Son-of-a-bitch! Anna-Belle O’Malley! He hadn’t stopped thinking about her since the previous day in Old Bexley. Anna-Belle O’Malley, after all those years. What goes around comes around, he chuckled to himself. He hadn’t been down to the medieval village of Old Bexley in decades, but reckoned it was high time he made his peace with his kid brother, Malachy. Malachy could be a bit tetchy, he being of the quick to anger, slow to forgive type, and they’d almost come to blows the last time they met ten years ago, so you can understand Jonah being a bit wary. Which explains why, upon leaving the railway station in the village he’d decided to pop into the old King’s Head for a couple of pints, to steady his nerves.

pub_kings_head_bexleyIt was just after midday. A laconic sun hung lazily in the sky and a chill wind was blowing up from the south. Anyway, Jonah pushed open the door to the saloon bar and there she was in her vintage Laura Ashley pinafore dress, sitting all alone like a displaced duchess, in the alcove by the fake leaded window, deeply engrossed in a paperback as thick as a brick. She had a gin and tonic on the go which looked as though she’d barely touched it. But maybe it’s not her first, Jonah thought, she’s never been averse to the odd tipple. He’d recognised her immediately. The unforgettable autumnal hues of her bubble-cut hair, cute curls framing a cute little face. And to cap it all, the old dear was even wearing a pair of sensible pumps, just visible under the table. Gone were the days, so it seemed, of stilettos that could pierce a man’s heart!

*

First time Jonah had ever really got to know Anna-Belle was about four decades ago in the Freemantle, a large function hall little more than a llama spit from the King’s Head. It was an eighteenth for one of Paddy Delaney’s girls, Julie or Josephine or Jennifer, or Jane. . . what the hell. . . and there she was, Anna-Belle O’Malley, herself just turned sweet sixteen. How well he remembered that do!

In those days Anna-Belle was one of God’s greatest creations, a little wisp of Jewish thrown in with the usual Anglo-Irish mix, had created something of a blueprint for female beauty. Petite at five foot two out of her plimsolls, she had the sort of endearingly deep ocean blue eyes you could drown in for hours, as long as there was oxygen in your tanks. And she was perky. Boy she had attitude and devilment all rolled into one: in short, she was fun!

That night there’d been a long line of lads snaking out the door waiting to say hello to her and get on her dance card, and her brother Jeremy was puffing and panting, barely able to keep order amongst them. But Jonah didn’t wait in line; he just sauntered up to her, cock-of-the-walk, took her pale lily-white hand into his own, and bent over and whispered “Pleasure,” in her ear. She gave him a cold, hard smile, whispered something like “bastard” under her breath and directed the daggers of her eyes at Jeremy, as if to say: “For the love of God, can you get rid of this creep!”

But she and Jonah, they’d had a history, a secret history. And that first meeting was not, truth be known, the first; nor was it the last, no sir. Now after all those years and the separate lives they’d led, there she was again. Anna-Belle O’Malley. Jonah ordered his pint and when it was ready he sidled over to her table with a sneaky grin on his face.

“Mind if I join you, ma’am?”
“’S a free country,” she said, not taking her eyes from her novel.
Jonah caught the title. She was reading War and Peace!
“You don’t remember me, do you?”
She raised her frosty eyes and examined his features closely, hesitated, and then it hit her.
“Jonah,” she said, “Jesus Christ, Jonah, what the. . . !”
And her mouth dropped and she said nothing else.
“Damn right,” he said, “been a long time, Anna-Belle. Too long?”
She caught the hint but did not react: picking up her glass, she took a gulp of her gin and tonic, spluttered some of it over her novel and set the glass down again, before slowly running her tongue over her lips. Jonah admired her small trembling hands and the manicured nails as she did so.
“Too long,” he said again. “So good to see you. How you been?”
“O,” she said cautiously, “I been. You?”
“O I been too. I been, all right. Plenty to tell if you have the time.”
And he paused and looked her over again. And they both just sat staring into each other’s eyes like two dredgers working the Thames and let the silence and dust of all those years wash over them.
“You’re looking so well,” Jonah said eventually. “By God, all those years and you’re looking so damn well.”
“Diet,” she said. “Melon and salad, and the odd bagel from time to time, can’t beat it. Plus I keep myself busy. Hard work, you ever heard of that?”
But for the merest flicker of a smile, Jonah let the shot pass over his bow without rising to the bait. Sharpest tack in the box as always, he thought to himself. Some things change, some people don’t. And she ain’t changed.
“Still teaching dance?”
“Aha.”
Jonah raised his glass in a toast.
“Well, here’s to you, babe. Anna-Belle O’Malley, son-of-a bitch. Here’s to you. No, here’s to us and to God knows what the future holds. Son-of-a-bitch!”

Editor’s note: This is not to be continued, under any circumstances.

The Cross – A North Kensington Tale

irlandesuk fiction , , ,

250px-Electric_Cinema_Notting_Hill_2009For the whole of the 1980s I lived in Ladbroke Grove, just up by Harrow Road and close to the Grand Union Canal. This was in the days before the catastrophe of gentrification. I was working at the time as a teacher in Holland Park School, and on Saturdays I would do my grocery shopping in the market at Portobello Road, often meeting pupils of mine who had Saturday jobs on the fruit and vegetable stalls. In the evenings or perhaps for a Saturday matinee, I might go to see a film at the Electric Cinema (pictured) which first opened in Portobello Road in 1910. Nowadays it’s a very smart place, but back then the seats were rickety and mice would be running between your feet as you sat and watched Bob Dylan and Sam Shepard in the crazy film, Reynaldo and Clara, which also featured Allen Ginsberg; or Elliot Gould playing Philip Marlowe in The Long Goodbye. But did I care?

I loved to ferret through the stalls looking for CDs or second-hand books, anything that took my fancy. It was there that I discovered two sensational CDs featuring Joe Arroyo, possibly Colombia’s greatest salsero, bought them for a couple of quid each. And before that, back in the days of vinyl, I bought four of John Lennon’s solo albums in a pop-up shop opposite Tesco, also for a couple of quid each. There was a family butcher’s in the Golborne Road where the meat and the service were always excellent; and I would sometimes go into the Cañada Blanch Spanish School at the very top of Portobello for lunch in the canteen there, where two of my Spanish friends taught: calamares a la romana, delicious! Above all, I loved the colour and the buzz on the streets and loved being part of that community. There were the Rastas smoking ganja on the corners, and the Spanish and the Morrocans and the Portuguese, and so many other nationalities, and everywhere heaved to the sound of Bob Marley. Get up, stand up, stand up for your rights!

Among the many characters in the area, and believe me there were many, there was a black man who used to carry a white cross. I would see him frequently in different parts of the borough but mostly in Ladbroke Grove, and on one occasion I even met him in the big supermarket up by the canal. He had put his cross down just behind one of the check-outs and was paying for his goods.

So the story below is actually a true story and it was published in my translation some years later in Managua, in the Saturday supplement of El Nuevo Diario along with the picture of a cross sculpted by the poet, Ernesto Cardenal. 

The Cross

ernesto crossLaminated white wood. An oak cross with white panels. The size of a man. A tall man, almost six foot six. A man with broad shoulders and a long neck. A man with short black hair. A black man, carrying a white cross. He says nothing as he walks along the street. Says nothing to anyone, but talks constantly to himself. Maybe he’s praying. Maybe not. He wears black trousers, worn at the knees. His trousers are tucked inside Wellington boots. His jacket is not black, but dark blue, the cuffs frayed. Under the jacket he wears a polo neck sweater, thin black wool. He goes up the street muttering under his breath and people gape at him as he goes. No one laughs in his face, but behind his back, people roll their eyes and a smile appears on their lips. An eccentric, carrying a huge white cross. Was a time in Virginia, a man could be crucified for less. The Klan would have told him what to do with that cross, that’s for sure. . . .

Bleeding Hearts – a foray into fiction

irlandesuk fiction, short story , ,

carverOver twenty years ago I began to write a collection of short stories called Bleeding Hearts. I took my inspiration from the short fiction I was reading at the time, in particular the brilliant stories by Raymond Carver (pictured) and Richard Ford. Written in a spare style, these narratives were about failure and loss, about life and lives falling apart, about dead-ends and dead-beat jobs, and in the case of Carver, hopeless addictions. They were human stories on a par with the best of Chekov and they dealt with the tragedies of everyday life which are every bit as profound as those of Sophocles or Shakespeare, God rest his soul.

I completed thirteen of my own stories, all set in the USA in places like Montana or Oregon. I knew nothing about these states other than what I’d picked up from the stories I was reading, but in a sense it didn’t matter: it was all theatre and the dramas could be staged anywhere, not excluding the moon, anywhere that human dreams and aspirations could come tumbling down, anywhere that love could slip through your fingers like a cool mountain stream, anywhere that heartache could burn through the soul like the royal waters of aqua regia.

I took the stories with me when I went to live in Central America for a couple of years in the early nineties, and I translated all thirteen into Spanish. A number of them were published in the Saturday supplement of the Sandinista newspaper, El Nuevo Diario. Shortly after, I ceased writing prose and concentrated on my poetry, which at the time I was writing and publishing in Spanish.

A dear old friend of mine read a handful of the stories a few months ago and when she’d finished she said: “Yes, all right, but when I get to the end of them I always want to know what happened next.” “Don’t we all,” I replied. She’s going to be even more frustrated if she reads today’s post.

Below is a fragment from a story which I never completed but which will convey some idea of how I was writing in those days. At some point in the future I will post a complete story, but for now this is it. Life is full of fresh beginnings and false starts and wrong trails, and it takes courage to press on to the end, and sometimes we just have to accept that we may never get there. So best sit back and enjoy the journey, one day at a time. . . .

Good Fortune

montanaI wake at dawn. Gayle is still fast asleep. My throat is dry. I reach for the glass of water on the bedside cabinet and drain it. My hands are shaking. I put down the glass. Gayle turns over and for a moment her eyes open. She looks at me and smiles. I lean across and kiss her on the forehead. She mutters something in a sleepy drawl which I cannot understand. I pull the covers up around her shoulders. You go back to sleep, I say. She smiles again and closes her eyes. I run my fingers through her grey hair. The hair is dry and brittle. Her soft skin is marked now with fine deep lines like a spider web of pain.

Years ago I used to think that we would never grow old, that somehow time would pass us by, we were so happy. Time did pass us by, but not in the way I imagined! This much I have learned: that nothing goes the way you think it will. When we were young, just starting out, we both believed that we would make it, that loving each other the way we did would be enough to get us through. We were both wrong. Gayle would say to me: I’ve got you, Luke, what more do I want? And I would say the same thing. We were that happy, and that naive. This is Montana, the Treasure State, and we haven’t a dollar to our name. We still have each other, still love each other. That’s something.

I slide out of bed and walk across to the window. I open the curtains a fraction and peer out. The sky is already a soft cerise. The world outside is silent but for the chorus of birds in the trees across the way. I know what I have to do. There is a sick feeling in my stomach, as though I have swallowed a great quantity of lead in the night. I let the curtain fall back. It’s going to be a fine day, a fine summer’s day, and for me, for me and Gayle, a make or break day. I skirt around the bed but before I leave the room I stop and stare at Gayle once more. In two months’ time she will be sixty. On the cabinet her side of the bed, her reading glasses are lying on top of a open copy of Fortune Magazine. Last night we read the story of a retired plumber in Milwaukee who made a million bucks in one year. After a lifetime attending to burst pipes during the winter months, he hit upon the idea of electrified lagging which would switch on automatically once the temperature dropped.

In the corner by the wardrobe is Gayle’s walking frame. Her hips are getting worse. . .